Study of Urban Inequality. Proposal for a Synthetic Index of Comprehensive Urban Vulnerability (ISVUI) in Bilbao

Abstract

Beginning with the first studies of the Chicago School and until today, urban inequality, and more precisely the study of vulnerable areas, has been a topic of study of the sociological discipline. The objective of this article is to present a synthetic index that allows urban areas, specifically neighborhoods, to be placed on a continuum with respect to their degree of vulnerability considering variables of sociodemographic, socio-occupational and residential nature. This index has been developed through a factor analysis of principal components. As a novelty, this comprehensive index is made up of four partial indexes that show in detail the origin of the vulnerability: social vulnerability, employment vulnerability, residential vulnerability and demographic vulnerability. Likewise, unlike other indices, the ISVUI does not use the 2011 Census data; instead, it uses the data from the 2018 Municipal Housing Statistics carried out by Eustat (Basque Statistical Institute). This allows to build an index updated to study the state of the Basque municipalities but comparable nonetheless with any other town of Spain thanks to the fact that said base includes census variables. In order to validate and show its descriptive nature, this index has been applied to the neighborhoods of Bilbao and compared with previous studies of the area. The results show the existence of a highly polarized and multi-dimensional vulnerability. The neighborhoods located at the most negative end show both a high general and partial vulnerability.